Milky Way, Zodiacal Light and Airglow

[StephenM]

Hi all,

Here is a panorama made by stitching together about 30 photos (each 30 sec with 6D and Samyang 14mm @ f/2.8 and 6400 iso) taken south-west of Brisbane last Sunday night.

The Milky Way can be seen arching overhead on the left hand side, and the planets Venus and Jupiter immersed in zodiacal light (which is sunlight reflected of dust particles orbiting the sun in the plane of the solar system) on the right hand side. Quite a lot of red airglow was also visible on this particular night.

The green beam on the far right is a laser being used to align the telescope to the star Arcturus.

Thanks for looking!

Cheers,
Stephen

[strongmanmike]

Really good photo Stephen, the scope and laser are not irrelevant, over lit or obtrusive and set the scene beautifully I recon, the scene makes me want to be there :thumbsup:

Mike

[gregbradley]

I think Stephen you need to adjust your white balance as the colour is skewed to the muddy reds/browns which is not the true colour of the night. I think Canon cameras tend to default to that look and need to be adjusted to bring it back. Generally white balance temp is around 3800K but adjust until the colours look close and no bias.

Sony and Fuji cameras come out right with auto white balance which is very convenient.

Greg.

[CJ]

+1. Fascinating image.

[AstroJunk]

Love it!